Friday, January 27, 2017

Preparing for Life after Democracy

I’ve been reading some recentarticles, trying to get a
sense of what the next few decades of life under a semi-democratic government might
look like. And I think I'm starting to figure it out.

Sales of Orwell’s 1984 are spiking as
I write this, but even in that book, people had jobs, kids, and lives, all
while operating under a cartoonishly evil surveillance state.

Obviously,
real governments have far more effective tools for neutralizing dissent. In a
practical, real-world sense, 1984's Winston never did anything to destabilize the
Party. His quiet, personal rebellion had no consequence to anyone other than
himself and Julia, the government would never have cared enough to get involved. Neutering any threat he posed would been as simple as firing
him, as his immediate economic and survival needs would ensure that making any bigger plans
was impossible.

Opposing
the government would make his life, not just dangerous, but profoundly unpleasant.

That’s the hidden trick, and why I made this digression.
People say they value liberty and democracy, but what they really care about is
safety and happiness. For all but a few small outliers, the preference is a comfortable, safe life
with kids. This is an explicitly cynical view, but even a cursory review
of past political platforms shows that people’s wants and needs don’t
drastically change over time.

In non-democracies, people sit
around complaining that the government sucks, but are realistic enough to know
that there isn’t much they can do about it. Fatalism becomes a way of life. And
if people think they can’t become meaningfully involved in civic life, and can’t
change their government, then it becomes true (whether or not it was true
already).

A rational response to this is the uncoupling of goods and
services from a non-responsive government. Take education, as an example.

In
many countries, both democratic and otherwise, the state guarantees education
for all children, paid for through taxation. But if the government is not to be
trusted, where "trusted" in this case merely means “relied upon”, then
enterprising and/or rich people will take matters into their own hands. If it’s
a necessary service, then people are still willing to pay for it, even if they’re
already being provided with a substandard product. So you quickly see a proliferation
of non-government services that mirror the government’s supposed offerings. The
bourgeoisie of any country are going to live in comfort, and it doesn’t matter
so much whether they approve of the government.

But this behavior doesn’t exist in a vacuum, the poor and
less well off become acutely aware that those with means are opting out of
governmental services. But there’s no use appealing to government bureaucrats,
they’re the same ones sending their children to private school.

Identifying the similarities with our current system is left
as an exercise for the reader, but the net result is a society with an unhappy
underclass, a comfortable rich, and an utterly dysfunctional government.

And why bother making a fuss, when it’s hard enough to get a
job already.